Comic Commentary Week: 5

click to see all of it*

Boy can I relate.  Parenting was easy when they were three and a half and one.  It's really hard now.  I forget to check Rachel's math homework and she misses some problems and it affects her grade (when did homework go from being practice to graded work?) and Elie's hurts aren't just falling and skinning her knees anymore (though she still does that enough) - well, neither of their hurts are that simple anymore...

And, well, just the other day - when one girl was angry and sarcastic toward the other...well, it was like holding a mirror up.  There's me.  There's what she's learning.  Oh, I know she's learning some good stuff too, and I see that too...  But the parenting failures... yeah, I see 'em.

And where I'm weak.  My kids will never be soccer stars.  They can't shoot hoops.  They really probably won't be very athletic... 'Cause I'm inside when I'm around.  They'll be good with words.  Maybe a little too good for their own, well, good.  And they'll be musical.  And creative.  And maybe a little lonely sometimes...

Science projects?  Yeah, that's what Darryl's working on, I think.  We did the volcano.  It was awesome.  Not so much as a science project, though.  I mean, I'd give the final project a B, maybe.  And the other project was measuring the different amounts of different brands and types of soda that spew out if you shake each two-liter bottle 14 times and have an 11-year-old open it in your driveway.  Again, pretty awesome.  Again, maybe a B... But we had fun at least...  Then we saw the other projects that some of the other kids did... Wow...  Parenting failure...  I give my "helping with science projects" a parenting C-...  Though my "letting them do awesome projects that create awesome messes that we can talk about for a long time" B+ ... So maybe that's a wash...

And it seems like the kids are always on to the next thing I'm not quite ready to handle... whatever that might be... I suppose my parents were probably in the same boat.  Maybe every generation?  I don't know...

And still kids grow up - and survive.  And get through science projects and soccer practices and hurts and math tests and can still hug mom and dad at night and say, "I love you."

So...maybe failure is too strong a word after all...

*I didn't save the date - copyright Rick Kirkman and Jerry Scott - no infringement intended